A FORECASTED heatwave over Christmas and Boxing Day has spurned a warning of caution from local CFA, with the authority fearing conditions could present the worst fire risk day the state has seen for a number of years.
As of 3pm on Monday, Bureau of Meteorology forecasts a maximum temperature of 34 degrees for Wangaratta on Wednesday and 40 degrees on Thursday, with winds of around 35km/h expected during the day.
An extreme fire danger risk was expected for the North East on Boxing Day with a catastrophic fire danger rating slated for the state’s west, which has already been engulfed by a massive week-long fire at the Grampians National Park.
CFA District 23 commander Daryl Owen said it was likely to be a Total Fire Ban across the state on Thursday and Friday and he urged the community to remain vigilant around open air fires, particularly keeping on top of barbeque safety.
“Check for gas leaks, tight fittings and don’t leave barbeques unattended,” he said.
“We don’t want any new fire starts, particularly in the North East and over the Christmas and New Year period...barbeque safety is of high importance.
“We’ll be recommending not to use campfires on Thursday or Friday and people should enact their fire plans accordingly and enjoy the festive and holiday period.”
Mr Owen said while the weather was expected to cool off on Friday, strong winds were expected to persist Thursday night into the morning and increase fire risk throughout Friday and into Saturday.
Mr Owen said one CFA District 23 strike team will be deployed to Central Victoria on Boxing Day to assist with ongoing efforts to fires in the state's west and be on standby for a to help fight the blaze at the Grampians as early as this weekend.
“The Western Victorian brigades have been working for quite a number of days on those fires,” he said.
“They’re [CFA District 23 strike team] being positioned to respond anywhere as needed but to provide some local coverage and into the west should it be needed.”
As of 3pm Monday, the fire in the Grampians had grown to around 43,500 hectares since it was ignited by a series of lightning strikes last week.
Multiple communities engulfed by the fire have been given evacuation orders, including tourist hub Halls Gap.
CFA District 23 acting assistant chief fire officer Steve Contessa said a number of people from the local area were already stationed at Horsham’s Incident Management Control centre in incident management roles.
Mr Contessa said if conditions over Christmas and Boxing Day were to affect the blaze as expected, the strike team would be deployed around Sunday or Monday following the three-day deployment of a District 24 strike team from Wodonga.
“We understand the workload over there is going to be quite intensive so we’re planning around a three-day rotation from this part of the state to support the west,” he said.
“We’re also sending further incident management team personnel from across the Hume region.”
Mr Contessa said conditions over Boxing Day had the chance to present the worst fire risk day the state has seen for a number of years.
Fires also remained ongoing at The Gurdies in Melbourne’s South East and Bullengarook, near Gisborne.
Mr Owen said the region still remained with adequate capability to fight fire risks in the North East over the weekend despite the deployment of the strike team.